PowerPivot Field List grey

[KennethRathkjen]

Hello there.

I hope someone can help me with this problem, or at least understand why this happens.

Every now and then, when i work on a big powerpivot report, i end up with the powerpivot field list getting greyed out like this:

Im unable to continue my work when this happens, and closing excel and opening the file doesnt help.

Does anyone know why this happens and/or what to do?

Thank you

Kenneth.

 

[RennyS]

I'm having exactly the same problem today. The only thing I can think of is that I was attempting to change a Measure Name by editing the measure name for "this pivot table only" and got an error. So I tried editing the cell in the upper left corner of the table where the measure name is, and that worked, but then the list went grey. I tried deleting the vertipak temp directory and rebooting, but no luck.

 

[RennyS]

Hi Kenneth,
I fixed it, but not sure exactly how. I closed the workbook, and rebooted. Then I created another workbook, and opened the PowerPivot window and copied in a small table I created quickly in Excel just to get some data in to the PP window. Then I created a PP table and the field list was there and appeared fine. I created the PP table with the few fields I had. This proved that PP is working OK on my machine. (Corporate Win7 with Excel 2010 32 bit). Then I reopened the workbook and deleted the sheet that I was creating when the error happened. I also toggled the relationship detection (which I usually have turned off due to my disconnected slicers tables). This caused the "relationship may need to be updated" update alert in the PP windows in the other worksheets that have my other pivot tables. I'm not sure exactly when the fields came back. I now seem to be ok. The net of this is to remove what may have caused this to occur, and toggle the relationship button. Also, save often with these big workbooks and save off safety copies. I'm guessing this stuff is not bulletproof yet. Good luck.

 

[RennyS]

Anyone found out what causes this? I have been saving previous versions but went a fair way in editing the workbook. Now I get this greyed out PowerPivot Field List area. Other workbooks are fine. I would hate to have to recreate all the edits. This is crazy. I've tried deleting the VertiPaq folders but no joy. Rebooting doesn't help. Jeez......

 

[Ozeroth]

Hi there,

I recall having this problem some time ago in Excel 2010.

At the time, I had over-ridden some measure names in multiple PivotTables by either over-typing on the PivotTable itself, or entering the names in the "Custom Name (this PivotTable)" field.
In doing this, I had introduced some naming conflicts (e.g. two different measures with Custom Name = "Quantity").

When I deleted the tab with the offending PivotTables, the field list reappeared (possibly after saving and reopening).

Similar issue mentioned here:
https://social.technet.microsoft.co...er-pivot-field-list-does-not-show?forum=excel

Owen

 

[RennyS]

Ozeroth,

I agree with your assessment. I'm using 2010 as well. I believe I did the same thing with a naming conflict. Normally in Excel if you have any sort of naming conflict you get an immediate warning/error so this isn't too uppermost in your mind when renaming the measures for a specific table, however, in this case, the problem remains silent, with the workbook now a time bomb! One can go for hours continuing to modify and improve the workbook, only to have the list greyed out upon refreshing or reopening the workbook. I am surmising that the list greys out when the PP Add-In can't deal with the naming conflict and gives up. I was able to use an earlier saved copy (save checkpoint backups, save often), but was disheartened when I had to do all the work to recreate many new DAX formulas since the last save; I typically use the "Edit Measure" in the context menu from the field list of Measures, but as this was greyed out in the most recent version there was no way to review the newly-created measures. However, what saved the day somewhat was the realization that I could go to the Power Pivot window and look at the DAX formulas there in the measures area below the data.

Thanks for answering the post.

Cheers.